Commentary by Susan Brinkmann, OCDS
A businessman who was raised Catholic is in the fight of his life over two embryos he created with his ex-fiance, Hollywood starlet Sofia Vergara, who he is suing for custody of his two little girls.
Bionews.org is reporting on the case of Sofia Vergara (Modern Family) and her ex-fiance, businessman Nick Loeb, who underwent IVF in 2013 with the intention of using a surrogate. One embryo failed to implant and the second attempt resulted in a pregnancy which ended in miscarriage. The couple created two more embryos, both females, which were frozen in anticipation of another attempted surrogacy, but they split before that could happen.
According to Loeb, the two signed an agreement that any embryos could be brought to term only with both parties’ consent.
Vergara says she’s content to let the embryos remain frozen indefinitely, which Loeb believes is tantamount to destroying them. He has offered to pay all expenses of having the girls brought to life if she will agree to void the contract and let them be born.
Loeb is banking on the courts to intervene, but the case history is not in his favor. His lawyers have identified 10 cases of frozen embryo disputes that involved a signed contract and only two were awarded in favor of the parent who was requesting custody.
But he’s not giving up. After the story leaked to the public, he published a moving op-ed in The New York Times in which he claims to believe that when a couple creates embryos for the purpose of life, they should be regarded as life, not as property.
“Does one person’s desire to avoid biological parenthood (free of any legal obligations) outweigh another’s religious beliefs in the sanctity of life and desire to be a parent?” he asks.
Loeb says he has had a lifelong desire to be a father and raise a family of his own after being abandoned by his mother at the age of one and being reared mostly by his father and an Irish Catholic nanny named Renee. Even though he was baptized Episcopalian, he spent most of his childhood attending Mass with Renee and became very much pro-life and “pro-parent”.
His first marriage produced no children and although he tried not to rush Sofia when they first began dating, a serious car accident made him realize how easily his dream of parenthood could be dashed. For reasons he left unstated, the two decided to attempt a pregnancy through a surrogate, which is how the embryos came to be produced.
“I take the obligation of being a parent very seriously,” he writes. “This is not just about saving lives; it’s also about being pro-parent.”
The Vergara-Loeb dispute shines a stark light on the perils of using unnatural means in the quest for parenthood. While Loeb’s desire to be a parent to his two little girls is laudable, why didn’t he let nature take its course? Why resort to IVF and a surrogate with a woman to whom he was not married, thus subjecting any potential embryos to exactly this kind of situation – relegated to a freezer while mom and dad duke it out in court.
Let’s face it, when we invite God into our plans to create life, things like this just don’t happen. Couples may have to wait, or perhaps they’ll have a pregnancy at an unexpected time, but an innocent child will not be subject to the life or death situation the Loeb-Vergara daughters are now facing.
The bottom line is that being a parent is a process that begins long before a child is conceived. It occurs as the heart of a mother and a father becomes selfless enough to act in a way that is in the best interest of the “other”. Only then are they truly receptive to the gift of the life of another and all of its attendant responsibilities.
Loeb’s fight for his embryos is noble – but it might not be enough to spare the lives of his frozen daughters.
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